Hope
by cedricsowner
Summary: Post Zugzwang. SPOILER ALERT. A slightly lighter take on the episode and the question of how to move on. One-shot.


**Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds and intend no copyright infringement. **

Reid didn't feel like talking. But he needed to eat. Food was a necessity. Without carbohydrate from food to replenish it, the liver glycogen stores could be depleted in less than 24 hours. Couldn't risk that. Not with Garcia on the prowl and just waiting for a chance to go all mother hen on him again.

So he walked into the next diner he could find and ordered breakfast at the counter. He had all the time in the world. The case was over, successfully wrapped up.

And there was no one waiting for him.

Reid tried one of the oldest tricks in the book of behavioral psychology by grabbing a newspaper and pretending to be interested in the main article. 85% of the customers of a diner won't approach a man at the counter for small talk if he looks busy.

The balding man in his late forties who flopped down on the seat right next to him didn't care.

"Man, did I have a night", he groaned and ordered scrambled eggs with bacon.

Reid contemplated replying in Russian. According to a study in the American Journal of Psychoanalysis 78% of all participants quickly ended a conversation with a polite smile when they found out their partner only spoke broken English. The other 22% tried making the conversation more comfortable for their counterpart by speaking louder and slower.

Trying to determine how high, from a statistical point of view, his chances were to have run into the latter type was tricky – multivariate analysis had to take into consideration that…

"I was woken up by one of my characters, can you believe that?", the man blurted out, interrupting Reid's thought process.

"It must have been a dream, I know, but oh boy, did it feel real." Obviously the man felt the need to share his trouble with someone, for he kept on talking no matter how much Reid tried to indicate by rustling with his newspaper and avoiding all encouraging body language signals that he was not interested.

"See, I'm a TV writer for one of those big shows, "Felonious Intellects", maybe you've heard of it?" He didn't wait for Reid to reply. "The show is about a team of federal agents that hunt serial killers; it's led by an attractive but in her personal dealings rather uptight lawyer type of person… her ex-husband died at the hands of a serial killer and now she's raising her little daughter alone… then there's a geeky technical analyst who makes everyone smile with his witty comments… a cougar type of woman who was married a couple of types…. And a young genius. She's kind of the baby of the team, very clever but a bit socially inhibited; lots of sadness in her past – mentally ill father, absent mother… well, a couple of episodes ago we finally created a love interest for her… we did a really slow, mysterious build up, hinted at all sorts of dark stuff in his background and carefully intensified their relationship step by step."

The man took a sip from his coffee and wiped a bit of sweat from his forehead.

"Well, long story short, in the episode we aired yesterday we killed him off – he died under unlucky circumstances at the hands of a stalker-gone-killer. You know, I just wanted to avoid turning the series into some silly romantic lovebirds nonsense… that's the harsh reality, you don't always get what you want. Authenticity, that was what I was aiming at. But the fans were outraged!" He seemed to be completely at a loss.

"And as if that wasn't enough, last night the character itself came visiting me in my sleep! She dragged me out of my bed, slapped me in the face and yelled at me what the hell I've been thinking!" The man groaned and buried his face in his hands. "It was HORRIBLE!"

"After all that buildup, the fans most likely feel cheated", Reid said. "They identify with the characters, rejoice and mourn with them. You said the genius character's life was wrought with sadness… the fans probably felt it was time to give her – and thus also them – a bit of long deserved peace. At least for a couple of episodes. You could have killed her off in the season finale, couldn't you?"

"What am I going to do now? I don't want a figment of my own imagination come screaming at me every night."

Reid shrugged his shoulders. He didn't watch much TV anyway and surely nothing about serial killers.

"Introduce a new love interest. Someone who will help him… I mean her… deal with the loss."

The man looked at Reid as if he had just said the wisest words in the world. He threw a couple of dollars on the counter and ran off.

A moment later the food the man had ordered was served. Reid looked at the plate in the waitress' hand and couldn't help but smile. "The eggs and the bacon are arranged like a ball-and-stick model of a proline molecule", he said.

"You noticed?", the young woman asked, flabbergasted. "I've been doing this all week, this morning I'm arranging α-amino acids… yesterday I did essential amino acids… you're the first one who ever made a comment."

She was pretty, short blond hair, twinkling blue eyes. Her laughter made Reid want to laugh along.

"My name is Hope", she said and extended her hand.

"Spencer", Reid said and shook it.


End file.
